Sam Brownback: “I rise to speak about the past year's judicial nominations, which is something on which several people have spoken…”

“I rise to speak about the past year's judicial nominations, which is something on which several people have spoken today. I just came from a meeting with the President where he was talking about his frustration in getting judicial nominees considered. He was quite animated and discouraged that we have not been getting more judicial nominees through the system--particularly circuit court judges. That is what he was stating. That is what the meeting was about. He wants to see more happening and more of them occurring, and we need to do so. People have been pretty clear on the information of what technically and specifically has happened. Since May 9 of last year, we have had 11 judicial nominees for the U.S. circuit courts of appeal. Those eleven were nominated 1 year ago. Since that time, only 3--including 2 Democrats--have been confirmed. Of the remaining 8, not one has even been scheduled for a hearing. We have not held hearings on these individuals. We need to get this done and start to move them forward. It is an issue that is engaging the country, and I think increasingly so, as we move into the fall. We have a number of pieces of legislation that I think, in the post 9-11 environment, will be considered and looked at by the courts and need to be reviewed. We need to have a fully staffed court. Right now we have a 20-percent vacancy on the circuit court; and within some of the circuits, it is even a much larger one.”